


a hero and a villain

by gingergenower



Series: doctor/mafia au [3]
Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Dubious Morality, Emotional Hurt No Comfort, Gun Violence, Implied/Referenced Domestic Violence, M/M, Mafia!Magnus, Medical Procedures, Medical Trauma, Panic Attacks, Slow Burn, Threats of Violence, doctor!alec, if part 2 was 30mph part 3 is 80mph
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-13
Updated: 2019-01-13
Packaged: 2019-10-09 16:04:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17409950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gingergenower/pseuds/gingergenower
Summary: “I hope it takes him hours to die,” Alec says, breaking the quiet. “And I hope he feels every second of it.”





	a hero and a villain

**Author's Note:**

> [carmenlire](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Carmenlire/pseuds/Carmenlire) is an angel; after a month of struggling with this, I really needed someone to just say it was ok. additionally, have you read [httbt](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14496678/chapters/33489132)? if not... go do that. she's a better writer than me.
> 
> also, a massive shoutout to everyone on twooter, who's been putting up with my whiny ass for the last month or so while I tried to figure out if I could even get this finished. thank you for gently encouraging, yelling support, and telling me to shut up and get on with it. you're all awesome.
> 
> title taken from [who I am](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MwtvktjEuOM) by the score

In hospitals, Alec isn’t usually given a chair to wait in. He’s given stats and symptoms to interpret, an IV needle and a squirming four-year-old, an entire ward to watch over with one overworked nurse. He doesn’t stare blankly at the floor with empty hands, his brother at his side. He isn’t told by one of the nurses he used to work with that Izzy’s CT scan was rushed through so he can’t even see her and he doesn’t listen to Simon explain how he’d found her in her apartment, the bruises around her throat black.

Six days before Christmas, he does.

Alec exhales, long and slow. Simon’s pacing the length of the waiting room, a steady pendulum, but Alec doesn’t watch him; Jace has his face in his hands, has for at least twenty minutes- he called Clary when Alec called their mom, and Alec heard him cry, but he’s been quiet since.

They don’t even know what happened.

“What’s taking so long?” Jace’s words are muffled his hands, but he makes no attempt to move, and Alec shakes his head slightly when Jace scrubs his face and looks up.

“Could be anything,” Alec says. His voice is level, but it’s not the professional calm he’s adopted for dealing with patients and their families- it’s numb, like someone else is speaking. “They might be waiting for the scan results. She might need an intubation, they’ll need to check blood flow to the brain and internal damage to her throat. They might take her to surgery. I don’t know, Jace.”

Simon stops. “Surgery?”

“Strangulation’s an effective way to kill someone,” Alec says, and Jace doesn’t react- he’s studied half a dozen forms of self-defence and martial arts for his job, it’s not news to him- but Simon looks like he wants to throw up, so Alec doesn’t elaborate.

There’s tinsel up in the waiting room, a bizarre parody of what Christmas is supposed to be. The Lightwoods are celebrating it on the 27th because he’s working the 25th, but he’s been looking forward to it for weeks. When he was a kid, he made sure Izzy and Jace were having fun, hugging his mom when his dad was absent and careless about the family he was supposed to prioritise. The older Alec got, though, the less pressure there was on it- and now it’s a day where he gets to lie in as late as Jace will let him, hang out and be silly and exchange presents with his favourite people, and gorge on as much food as he likes.

They weren’t supposed to meet up today.

Phone buzzing in his hand, it’s Alec’s mom calling. He answers and tries to breathe evenly, keep his mind as clear as possible. If there are decisions that need to be made- about treatment, potential risks involved, whether or not to try to save Izzy’s life- without their mom there, Alec knows they’ll fall to him. He knows the most; he trained for this.

“We haven’t heard anything yet,” Alec says, and she inhales sharply down the phone. “I’m sorry.”

“… _ok_ ,” she says, trying to be strong and so fragile at the edges. “ _Ok. I’m nearly there. Less than 20 minutes, I’m just getting a cab_.”

“I’ll call you if anything changes.”

“ _Brooklyn Hospital Center_ ,” she says, muffled and to someone else at the other end of the line, and then back to Alec, “ _thank you_.”

“Yeah,” Alec says, and there’s nothing else to say but he doesn’t want to hang up. “I love you, mom.”

 “ _I love you too, Alec_ ,” his mom says, so terrified and so certain it cracks something inside him.

A side door- innocuous, not the one Alec expects- opens. Simon stops in front of the nurse that walks out of it, Jace leaping to his feet, but Alec doesn’t move.

He’s watched her break news to families ten times a shift for six months. He knows what tempered concern in her eyes means, rather than jaded sadness.

Squeezing his eyes shut, trying not to breathe, he lowers his head.

She explains the CT scan came back clear, so while Izzy’s in a great deal of pain and the bruising’s bad, they’re going to keep her for 48-hour observation only as a precautionary measure because there’s no internal damage at all.

After a few, deep breaths- ignored under Jace and Simon’s babble of questions, of what it _means_ \- Alec nods and lowers his hand.

Phone still pressed to his ear, Alec recounts everything the nurse said to his mom. He waves off Jace and Simon to go ahead and see Izzy when they hover, uncertain, and assures his mom he’s going to talk to the doctors and double check the results.

Once he’s hung up, his trembling fingers put the phone aside and he leans forward, head between his knees, staring at the floor between his feet.

He was sparring at the gym with Jace. They were talking about Jace’s new gig- stunt double on an indie movie to a big actor, full time work for four months- when they got the call, and he’s still wearing his boxing shoes and joggers. He threw on a coat but he’s otherwise still dressed for a workout, his gym bag with his regular clothes in on the seat next to him.

Heaving himself to standing, Alec throws his bag over his shoulder and heads into the ward, one of the doctors Alec worked with at the desk, and there’s a flash of recognition across her face as Alec puts his elbows on the desk and says hello.

“Have you got bed six’s file?” Alec asks. “I just want to check something.”

She lingers on his lack of scrubs, frowning, until she reads the paperwork in front of her, scanning the details. Tapping the folder with her pen and turning to her computer as he takes out the scan results, she lets him hold them up to the light.

He can’t see any obvious damage, and squints at the second scan. “Has she said anything about the attack?”

“Not much, she’s struggling to talk,” the doctor says as Alec reads the notes added to her file, like it isn’t a confidential file she should never have let him have, “but she says she didn’t know her attackers, and there were three of them. Any chance it’s the boyfriend?”

Alec blinks. The geeky thing doesn’t appeal- Alec doesn’t have a type, but Simon wouldn’t be his if he did- and he doesn’t entirely understand why Izzy gave Simon a shot, but he’s never seen Izzy so happy. Simon makes her laugh, uncontrollable giggles at nothing; blush when he looks for her in a crowded room when he’s singing; glow when he gives her a stuttering and entirely sincere compliment.

He shakes his head. “I don’t think so. He found her, he brought her in.”

“Hm,” she says, and Alec knows what she’s thinking. Petty crime in the area is the lowest in the state, has been for about five years- they keep getting overspill from Manhattan and upstate. Most people know their attackers, especially women, even if they don’t admit it. “Well, a detective’s on the way.”

“Who?”

“Garroway,” she says, and Alec nods, glancing over his shoulder at her bed.

Garroway’s good. Garroway’s one of the best, the kind of presence that calms, the kind of man who wants to help people.

There are too many machines, too many softened voices, to pick out Simon or Jace or hear what they’re saying.  “Thanks,” Alec says quietly, turning, but as he’s halfway across the ward, most curtains pulled closed, bed six’s curtain draws aside and Jace steps out, closing it just as quickly.

He sees Alec and sighs, approaching him.

“How is she?” Alec asks, and Jace glances over his shoulder, as if worried they might hear.

“She asked me to get her a drink,” Jace says, strained. “So I’m going to the vending machine. Do you want anything?”

“No, thanks.”

Jace nods, not really listening, stare fixed over Alec’s shoulder. He’s pale, and runs his fingers through his hair, a nervous habit. “I don’t- understand. She said she got cornered on the way back to her apartment, they were waiting outside the building- why would someone _do_ that to her?”

“I don’t know,” Alec says, and tries not to think about it, instead stepping in to hug Jace, who takes a few seconds to cling back tightly. “But I just looked at her scan results, and she’s going to be fine. Ok?”

“Yeah.” Jace hangs on for a few seconds, and when he pulls back he wipes tears away. “I think I’m going to call Clary and let her know Izzy’s ok. I think she said something about getting out of work and coming down so she might be on her way.”

“Ok.”

Jace takes a deep breath, then nods. “Thanks, man.”

“Course,” Alec says, hand on his shoulder as he passes by, and waits until Jace disappears around the corner before he frowns.

There are some things Izzy and Alec only say to each other over glasses of wine at each other’s apartment. Death is too intimate to speak aloud, and easier to share it with someone who doesn’t need them to- and Alec sees a lot of abuse victims insisting they fell on their necks, like a terrible teenage excuse for a hickey, and Izzy sees a lot of their corpses- and she’s a forensic pathologist. She knows all the specific ways this could have killed her. Why did she text Simon from her apartment, not call an ambulance in the street-?

Approaching the partition, he glimpses her through a gap between the curtains.

She’s hooked up to a drip, oxygen mask pulled aside. Her vitals bleep continuously, and he sees a slither of the bruise- a handprint around her throat, purple in the stark hospital light. Simon leans into view, and Alec only catches the thread of their conversation mid-sentence.

Izzy’s voice is raw, an octave lower than usual, and it’s so muted and painful it’s like she still has hands around her throat.

“-three of them.”

“Don’t worry about any of that right now,” Simon says, fingers threading through hers. “You need to sleep.”

She ignores him, stronger with determination. “Said they know what you do, and your boss needs to stop interfering, or they’ll kill you.”

“My- boss.” He sounds confused on the first word and not at all on the second, face falling, dread seeping into his tone.

He’s the first boyfriend Izzy’s had that Alec’s thought of as harmless. Naïve, occasionally, but not the kind of person that would or could get her in trouble. His boss is a _band manager_ , for god’s sake.

“Iz-”

“Said they’d kill me, if I went to the cops.”

Pressing a hand over his own mouth so he doesn’t make a sound, Alec swallows his horror.

“…you weren’t supposed to- I’m so sorry.” Simon’s voice cracks, both hands holding one of Izzy’s. “I’m so _sorry_ , no one was supposed to get hurt, this isn’t- I’m going to make this right. They’re not going to hurt you again. Ok?” Scrambled but sincere, Simon waits for Izzy’s nod, and then he exhales, kissing her forehead. “And I’ll- I’ll explain everything. I just need to call Raphael first.”

For a moment, Alec thinks- no, no way, that’s too much of a coincidence, Raphael’s a common enough name, there’s a famous fucking turtle with it- but the denial dies fast. Simon’s boss got them into _Pandemonium_ , and that’s where he met Magnus for the second time. Raphael, the guy who works for him, was there.

It couldn’t be anyone else.

Shivering, Alec backs up a few steps, not knowing what the fuck to do. Izzy isn’t just hurt, she wasn’t just attacked in some random mugging, she’s caught up in organised crime and she doesn’t even know it.

He never told Izzy about seeing Magnus again. He wanted to, tried to bring it up at her apartment and his, but he didn’t know how to say it. A couple of weeks passed, and he just decided to do his best to forget. He didn’t think she’d ever need to know, not like this- thought she’d be safer not knowing.

Even if Alec told the cops what he heard, even if he got Simon thrown into jail to protect Izzy, would it work? Would it keep her safe? It’s too late to break them up, she’s already a face they know, and they said they’d kill her if the cops found out.

…and cops can be bought, anyway.

Ducking back out of the ward and heading towards the hospital entrance, Alec starts texting. He tells Jace he’s left and he needs Jace to stay with Izzy, but to call if there’s a problem. As he gets out of the building, he turns left towards the taxi rank and hails a cab, a less-used number in his contact list getting a different message as the cab slides up next to him.

_911- my place, now. I need you._

***

By the time Alec gets back to his apartment Magnus is already waiting for him, feet up on the coffee table like he didn’t break in. All the clean lines of his suit sharp, his dark makeup precise, Magnus regards Alec for a moment and then settles into the couch a little more comfortably.

“Alexander, I hope this is important. I’m a busy man.”

The door shuts with a crack; Alec drops his bag and doesn’t look where it lands. “What _exactly_ does Simon do for Raphael?”

“Hmm?” Magnus seems reactionless, but something shifts behind his eyes- more guarded, less casual.

“Simon Lewis. He works for Raphael, right? I want to know what he does.”

The slightest crease forming between his eyebrows, Magnus tilts his head. “How do you know Simon works for Raphael?”

“Simon’s girlfriend was hospitalised today.” Alec didn’t even realise until the cab pulled out he didn’t see Izzy, he didn’t tell her he loved her; but he didn’t turn back around. He needs to do this. “They got talking, I was listening.”

“I heard about what happened to her,” Magnus says, holding up his phone, like he was in the middle of texting when Alec arrived. “But-”

“She said they attacked her to get to Simon’s boss, and what I’m wondering is: did they mean Raphael, or you?”

Halfway through the question, Alec already knows the answer- Magnus takes his feet off the coffee table, watching him wearily. “The message was for me.”

“What exactly was the message?”

“Private.”

“Tell me what it was.”

Magnus narrows his eyes. “Why’s it so important to you?”

A pause, a disbelieving stare- a quickening fury that makes Alec huff out a laugh. “You don’t even know her name, do you?”

“Simon’s girlfriend?”

“Yeah.”

Magnus frowns, as though confused by the turn of the conversation. “Her name’s Isabelle.”

“Her name’s Isabelle _Lightwood_.” Alec sees the connection happen in Magnus’ head- and lips parting in shock, he stares at Alec. “She’s my sister.”

“Your sister.”

“Yeah,” Alec says. He’s shaking. “They strangled her. She was alone and there was _three_ of them and they hurt her because they wanted to _get a fucking message to you_ -”

“I know,” Magnus says, hand up in a gesture to stop, bowing his head in surrender. “I _know_.”

The last word’s a whisper, like it’s an effort he can hardly afford. Like people don’t drop dead around him regularly.

Like he isn’t the one who pulls the trigger.

Abrupt, Magnus stares back at Alec. “Is she- Raphael said she would be ok, that the doctors thought she’d be ok-?”

“Yeah, probably.”

“And she has insurance?”

“Yes.”

Magnus nods, lowering his head again, shrinking back in on himself. His phone plinks, a tiny ringtone that lilts up at the end, and it takes Magnus a few seconds to even react, sweeping his thumb across the screen to read the text.

“The… message,” Magnus says, sliding the phone into his chest pocket of his blazer rather than answering, “was not anything specific. This wasn’t a warning, or a punishment, or… an action I took. The man who ordered three thugs to attack your sister did so as a test, of sorts.”

“A test for you.”

“Yes. Isabelle is no more than collateral damage to him. He could’ve just as easily ordered those thugs to outright kill your sister, but he didn’t for a reason. He wanted to make sure it got back to me.” Magnus inhales. “There are a number of people who want to challenge my position, but they’re not sure how I’ll react, especially as I’ve been… lenient, thus far. Restrained.”

The question in Alec’s eyes is enough for Magnus to understand.

“The thugs who attacked your sister- they’re delivering a message for me, return to sender,” Magnus says, his tone matter of fact, his word precise and cold. “He’s getting a bullet in the brain.”

It’s like- it’s nothing to hear. There’s no visceral proof, and Alec’s struck by just how empty the words are even though the weight of them should sicken. Alec doesn’t feel anything.

He clenches his jaw. “And the thugs?”

“Their allegiance was moved so easily… I imagine they won’t be able to stay in the city,” Magnus says, eyebrows raising for a split second, as if indifferent to them. “I don’t think they understand how valued loyalty is.”

They know her face, they know her name- they attacked her outside her apartment, they know where she _lives_. “You’re not killing them.”

“It would be unnecessary.”

“I need her safe.”

“She will be safe-”

“They’re still out there, they’re still walking around and _killing_ people, do you seriously expect me to believe that-?”

“Yes,” Magnus snaps, glaring at Alec. “I do.”

“Why? Why the hell _should_ I?”

“Because if I thought killing them would do any good I would do it.” Magnus stands, dark with rage, voice forcefully controlled. “But they’re three thugs with a price in a _city_ of thugs with a price, Alec. Killing them would be an act of vengeance that wouldn’t do Isabelle any good. She wouldn’t be any safer.”

Alec clenches his jaw and doesn’t answer because he doesn’t want to verbalise _kill them anyway_.

When Izzy was three, a monster started sleeping under her bed. Alec couldn’t stop the monster sleeping there, and he couldn’t convince his parents to get rid of it, so one night, he locked the monster in the closet. For the first few nights, he snuck into her room and had a sleepover with her, but once she was sure the monster couldn’t get out of the closet she slept on her own again.

He was her big brother before he ever wanted to be a doctor.

“Are you sure this is enough?”

“Yes,” Magnus says, quieter. “An execution is… extreme. I’m hoping it’ll remind them who I am and keep everyone safe. At least for a while.”

Alec nods; Magnus exhales.

“Do you think she’ll stay with him?”

“Simon? No idea.”

“He does adore her.” A smile flickers across Magnus’ face, more to himself. “I think Raphael’s been planning to murder him just to shut him up- every time she shows up to one of his gigs, it’s like he’s physically incapable of stopping talking about her.”

“He’s the reason she got hurt.”

“No, he isn’t. He’s a musician and he doesn’t do anything illegal,” Magnus says, flat. “This was about me.”

The city below hums with traffic and people, but the apartment’s strange stillness rattles around inside. Magnus settles against the arm of the couch, twisting one of his rings around his finger, and Alec doesn’t flinch away from his even gaze.

He’s spent years learning all the intimate, tiny details he needs to know to save life. He already has sleepless nights, unable to speak aloud the mistakes he’s made, and saving Magnus damaged the only, fragile part of himself he believed in, but he isn’t going to look away now. He’s not going to try to save himself.

“I hope it takes him hours to die,” Alec says, breaking the quiet. “And I hope he feels every second of it.”

Magnus’ expression falls into understanding after only a moment, and he hesitates. Straightening up, taking his time to approach Alec, he stops as he reaches him. “It won’t. I told them to make sure it’s clean.”

Alec nods once. He, perhaps, shouldn’t have said that aloud; easier to deny in only his mind, but…

The sensation of knowing- more instinct than intellect- Alec learned to recognise elbows-deep in gunshot victims, in the choice between limbs and life and in the eyes of the other doctors and nurses.

And he can feel it now.

One hand slides inside Alec’s open coat to rest on his waist, and the other reaches up to cup Alec’s cheek, thumb touching the corner of Alec’s mouth. Eyes fluttering shut, Alec leans into Magnus’ palm. His skin’s a shade too cool, the metal of his rings warm, and Alec swallows, finding the delicate material of Magnus’ shirt and tightening his fingers in it.

It’s too intimate, too exposed.

“When you left. How was she?”

“In pain,” Alec says, and thinks of the text he didn’t answer: Jace asked what the hell could be so important he needed to leave the hospital. “I need to go back, I didn’t even talk to her, I-”

He cuts himself off, Magnus’ hand settling on Alec’s neck, fingertips touching collarbone.

Iz won’t believe any lie he tells her- she knows just how deeply and desperately he loves her, would do anything for her- but he can’t tell her the truth. He can’t admit he abandoned her to chase away the monsters, to murder the men who attacked her. They aren’t children. She won’t admire him with wide eyes and the kind of adoration only younger siblings have for their older brothers and sisters.

Unfocussed when Magnus’ phone buzzes, Alec blinks a few times to see Magnus’ expression as he reads.

“It’s done.”

It takes- a moment, a few seconds, to process what that means. The emotionless in Magnus gives Alec no cue as to what he’s supposed to feel, and Alec swallows, throat sharp with nausea. His legs don’t feel- he can’t feel them, can’t feel his hands, can’t feel anything. A guy had his brains blown out and Alec asked for it, he’s glad for it, that’s who he is now-

His breathing hitches. He still wouldn’t take it back; he needs to be able to promise Izzy she doesn’t have to live in fear, but no matter how many people he tries to save and no matter what he ever tries to do he will always be _this_.

“Alec?” Magnus says, hands cautious on his chest.

“-can’t-”

Magnus moves to step back out of Alec’s space but Alec can’t let go of him, doesn’t know how to uncurl his fingers, so Magnus changes tactic, stepping closer, chest almost touching his. “Alexander-”

“I- I wanted this-”

“But you didn’t do it, I did. Please, Alexander, shh-”

“Can’t.”

“Yes, you can,” Magnus says, leaning forward enough to rest his forehead against Alec’s, eyes closing. “You _can_.”

Alec squeezes his eyes shut and listens hard, trying to focus on Magnus’ breathing. He hasn’t had a panic attack in over a year but he’s never had someone with him, he never let Izzy or Jace or his mom see him like this, cooped up at college and trying to convince himself he could get through the next test, the next lecture, he could survive it because he _had_ to.

“It’s going to be ok,” Magnus says even as Alec’s breathing catches, voice light and soothing, nothing but stability for Alec to lean on. By increments, Alec’s lungs relax, throat hurting, and Magnus murmurs again that it’s going to be alright, pulling back just enough to see Alec’s nod. He gently tilts Alec’s jaw up. “She’s safe; you’re safe.”

Magnus’ tone is so kind, his observation so careful, Alec’s reminded of himself checking small children on the ward. This is the same man who called himself a monster, who _wanted_ Alec’s fear.

_He never lets himself have anything. Not even you._

“Does this mean you’ve- paid off your debt to me?”

“You didn’t ask anything of me,” Magnus says lightly.

Another, shaking breath- and Alec shouldn’t ask because there’s no answer he wants, but he forces himself to anyway. “You said you’re a monster.”

Halting, hand stiff on Alec’s waist, Magnus’ eyes flick up and down Alec’s face.

“You thought Izzy was just a groupie of some kid who works for you. You defend Simon, you saved my kid at the hospital…”

Magnus’ jaw tightens. “Alec-”

“Why do you want me to be afraid of you?”

Dark with unfiltered emotion, Magnus’ eyes glitter dangerously. “Because you clearly aren’t.”

If he wants a contradiction, Alec doesn’t give him one- he half shrugs, a little helpless. He’s not; there’s a glint of challenge in Magnus’ eyes, so Alec lets Magnus’ shirt go and steps back, scrubbing his face, checking he has his wallet and keys.

“You let yourself in, you can let yourself out,” he says, swallowing and backing up, towards the door. He needs to go to Izzy.

“Alexander-”

“Thank you, for- everything.” Without looking at Magnus again, Alec shuts the door, turning on his heel and striding away, skipping down the steps.

He doesn’t have the time to deal with any of this. He can’t think about any of it. Not yet.

**Author's Note:**

> <3 this was hard, so encouragement would be really appreciated. and I'm starting part 4 once I've recovered from this!


End file.
